2020 Action

Stop Making More Nuclear Bombs

Republican Senators, led by Arizona’s Jon Kyl, are demanding a dramatic expansion of US nuclear bomb production capabilities in current budget negotiations. They want to ensure $12 billion in 2012 funding for new or greatly enlarged facilities in Kansas City, MO; Los Alamos, NM; and Oak Ridge, TN that would quadruple current nuclear warhead production from 20 to 80 per year. This is part of the $85 billion they seek to lock in over the next ten years for the weapons programs of the National Nuclear Security Administration.

President Obama acquiesced to the 2011 funding of these programs to secure last year’s Senate ratification of the New START treaty with Russia. But that is where it should stop. Building new warhead production facilities wastes money and decreases our national security. The New START treaty mandates dismantling warheads and reducing fissile materials worldwide.

The U.S. has a backlog of over 4,200 nuclear warheads currently slated for dismantlement. This could take up to 15 years at current rates. The speed of dismantling existing weapons has greatly decreased in recent years. The same facilities are being used instead to “modernize” our active nuclear arsenal of 5,113 warheads, and we are waiting for another new plant to be built at Savannah River, SC to reprocess the plutonium from weapons into expensive and dangerous “MOX” as fuel for nuclear reactors.

We need to stop these four new facilities immediately, and redouble efforts to dismantle our warheads and rid the world of tons of excess plutonium through relatively safe nuclear waste disposal methods such as “vitrification” and burial.

Ask them, in the 2012 budget, not to fund any expansion of our nuclear weapons making or plutonium processing facilities, and to spend a fraction of the funds saved to quickly process the backlog of weapons waiting to be dismantled, and to safely neutralize the plutonium they contain.

Via their websites: www.senate.gov

Telephone: 202 224-3121 (senate switchboard)

Write: Senator (first & last name)

US Senate, Washington, DC 20510

Photo credit: Mushrooms, Nass River, BC, 1971, by Charles Sprague. 

Four Years to Rein in Loose Nukes

In April 2009, President Obama in Prague pledged "a new international effort to secure all vulnerable nuclear material around the world within four years." Last year, the leaders of all 47 nations at the Nuclear Security Summit adopted these goals and a detailed plan to achieve them.
 
This commitment is now being tested. Obama's FY2011 budget includes nearly $1.7 billion for "improving controls on nuclear weapons, material, and expertise."* This covers 19 programs in the Departments of State, Energy, and Defense. It represents an increase of $394 million over 2010, expanding efforts to remove or secure highly enriched uranium and other fissile materials in sites around the world, helping Russia convert weapons-grade plutonium into nuclear reactor fuel, establishing regional nuclear security "centers of excellence," and increasing training for those who track and secure nuclear materials.
 
House and Senate subcommittees voted last summer to provide full funding for most of these programs, but that is now being threatened. Even though these initiatives are critical to preventing the unauthorized access to nuclear materials and devices, they are under attack by the Republicans' plans to severely cut all except military budgets.
 
The nonproliferation effort is too important to let Capital Hill politics control the outcome. The threats of nuclear catastrophe are real, and can only be reduced through such programs by the U.S. and other countries.  This budget barely covers what is needed to achieve the four-year goal.  The cost of a nuclear disaster will be far greater than preventing one. And the toll in human lives and suffering would be unfathomable.

Contact your Senators and urge them to oppose any reduction in funding for programs their committees have already approved to secure, control, and reduce weapons-grade nuclear materials worldwide. Don't let short-sighted budget-cutting do damage to these essential efforts to prevent nuclear disaster.

Contact information:
 
Telephone: Call the Senate switchboard (202) 224-3121, ask for your Senator's office. Once there, ask for her/his legislative aide on defense issues and leave your message with that aide.
Online: Click here: www.senate.gov, search for your senator, and leave a message.
Write: Senator (first & last name), U.S. Senate, Washington D.C. 20510

*As analyzed by Matthew Bunn in his excellent report, Securing the Bomb, available online at www.nti.org.

Photo: Moss Heart, by Edie Mueller.

Best Chance to Get New START Treaty Ratified

We've asked you previously to contact your Senators about the New START Treaty. Now, in early December, the US Senate is scheduled to vote on the Treaty. If the Senate votes for ratification, we can then move forward with plans to reduce the number and the role of nuclear weapons worldwide. If our Senate does not approve this Treaty, the uncertainty of both our countries not having inspections of the other’s arsenals will likely lead to a nuclear arms race. The time is critical. To garner wide support for this issue, we ask that you quickly write a letter to the editor of your local or statewide newspaper(s). The Senate vote is imminent.

Below is sample text for your letter to the editor. Use it as is, or adapt it. The important thing is to send it off quickly to one or more papers.

Dear Editor,

Amid the drama of the November elections, a very important vote coming up in the Senate has been largely overlooked—whether to ratify the New START Treaty between the US and Russia. The Treaty needs 67 votes for ratification. December 5th marks the one year anniversary since our military has inspected Russia’s nuclear weapons. Each day that passes without New START ratified is another day our country walks blind, unable to assess Russian arsenals. This treaty will reduce deployed long-range nuclear weapons by 30%, and put in place stringent verification measures. Ratification is critical to avoid a new arms race with both escalating dangers and escalating costs. I encourage readers to call Senator............ and Senator............, [insert the names of both your Senators] at the Capitol switchboard, 202 214 3121, and urge them to vote to ratify the New START Treaty. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates and the entire upper-level military have come out strongly in favor of this treaty, because, they say, it is crucial for America's security.

Sincerely,
[Your name, return address, and a phone number where the paper can reach you to verify that you wrote the letter]

Note: Because of the short timing, it would be best to submit your letter on the paper's website or by fax. Also, please call both of your senators' offices directly, and urge them to vote to ratify the New START Treaty.

Photo: Untitled (goat rides hours), Tim Barber 2002.

Make America Safer, Ratify New START

The Senate Foreign Relations Committee has voted to send the New START Treaty to the whole Senate for ratification, which requires 67 votes. Calls are needed to Senators opposing or sitting on the fence. This Treaty between the US and Russia will decrease both of our nuclear arsenals and guarantee improved verification. Here are three national security arguments:

• In 1987 a bi-partisan vote ratified a verification regime Ronald Reagan negotiated with the Russians, by Reagan. Since December 2009 all inspection agreements have expired. This is dangerous. In June 2010 General Kevin Chilton, responsible for our strategic nuclear deterrent, testified to the Foreign Relations Committee, “If we don't get the treaty, [the Russians] are not constrained in their development of force structure and . . . we have no insight into what they're doing. So it's the worst of both possible worlds."  Seven former Strategic Command Chiefs join him in support of the treaty.

• Secretary of Defense Gates reports, “New START has the unanimous support of America’s military leadership.” The treaty was negotiated in close consultation with U.S. defense and intelligence agencies, winning their broad-based support.

• “Trust but verify” (Reagan’s wisdom) is honored in this treaty with more streamlined, cost-effective verification than previous treaties. On-site inspectors are assured access, consultation, and new tools. They will be able to count deployed and un-deployed warheads. Inspectors on the ground are a must. Satellites cannot inspect inside buildings.

New START deserves bi-partisan support, “on account of the dangerous weapons it reduces, the critical defense capabilities it preserves, the strategic stability it maintains, and, above all, the security it provides to the American People.” (Secretary Gates, Wall Street Journal, May 13, 2010)



Contact your Senators. Thank them if they are for New START, urge their support if they are not. Point out that this treaty improves on past verification measures and continues the progress made by Republican and Democratic Presidents in reducing the nuclear threat. We cannot afford to go backwards.

Telephone: Call the Senate switchboard at (202) 224-3121, ask for your Senator's office, and once there, ask for her/his legislative aide on defense issues and leave your message with that aide.
Email: Click through to your Senator's website using www.senate.gov and leave a message.
Write: Send a postcard to: Senator (first & last name), U.S. Senate, Washington D.C. 20510.  (Postcards won't be delayed like envelopes will in the check for dangerous substances).

August 2010 Postcard: START Vote Sept. 16 or 17

UPDATE: The Senate Foreign Relations Committee is scheduled to vote on the START Treaty September 15 or 16

A Senate vote on the New START (Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty) is now set for Sept. 15 or 16. Favorable hearings have been held in both the Foreign Relations and Armed Services Committees. Positive reports from the National Intelligence Council and State Department on verification under the treaty were delivered to the Senate the first week in July. Republican Senators have demanded and received major funding for nuclear processing and weapons facilities designed to maintain a "robust nuclear weapons deterrent" in return for their support of the treaty.

Yet, as with every initiative by the administration during the past year, opposition is developing among the President's political opponents. Quick work is essential to counter these assaults and assure passage of the treaty. For example, in spite of treaty support by the defense establishment and the majority of living former Secretaries of Defense and State, Mitt Romney attacked the treaty in a Washington Post editorial as Obama's "worst foreign policy mistake yet” and called on Senate Republicans to block ratification. Immediately Senator Lugar, ranking Republican Senator on the Foreign Relations Committee, and strong supporter of the treaty, charged that Romney "repeats discredited objections and appears unaware of arms control history and context."

In particular, the opposition is focusing on supposed restrictions put on U.S. missile defense. Yet as Lugar points out, the treaty's preamble is non-binding, and "nothing in the Treaty changes the bottom line that we control our own missile defense destiny." The treaty strengthens our security in every way, and, Lugar notes, "Rejecting the Treaty would guarantee that no agreement on tactical nukes would occur. It also would mean giving up our human verification presence in Russia that has contributed greatly to strategic stability...New START would strengthen our non-proliferation diplomacy worldwide." Click here for the full text of Lugar's statement.

Ask your Senators to support the New START and to press their colleagues on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee to swiftly bring the Treaty to a positive vote. Also contact friends and relatives in key states such as Georgia and Tennessee, asking them to contact their own Senators. Click here for a full list of key Senators for this vote.

In addition, go see the movie "Countdown to Zero" opening in select cities July 30. This movie "makes a swift, soberingly urgent case for the comprehensive elimination of nuclear weapons," says Ann Hornaday in The Washington Post.

Contact Information:

Telephone: Call the Senate switchboard (202) 224-3121, ask for your Senator's office. Once there, ask for her/his legislative aide on defense issues and leave your message with that aide.
Online: Click here: www.senate.gov, search for your senator, and leave a message.
Write: Senator (first & last name), U.S. Senate, Washington D.C. 20510

June 2010 Postcard: A New START

  

The New START (Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty), signed by President Obama and Russian President Medvedev on April 8th, puts us back on track for binding agreements to reduce the threat of nuclear annihilation. The treaty limits the number of deployed  strategic warheads to 1,550 per country, and the number of delivery vehicles to 700 per country. It establishes the most extensive verification process ever agreed upon by the two nations, including 18 on-site inspections per side per year, and, for the first time, direct inspections of the weapons themselves. This is far from nuclear abolition, but it is an important step toward nuclear arms control.

As Secretary of Defense Robert Gates argues: "The U.S. is far better off with this treaty than without it. It strengthens the security of the U.S. and our allies and promotes strategic stability between the world's two major nuclear powers."

It is critical that the U.S. Senate ratify the treaty as soon as possible. The treaty has been well received by Democrats and Republicans alike in the hearings so far, with one major, and dangerous, concession demanded to secure the needed 67 votes:  an $80 billion commitment (not part of the treaty itself) to "modernize" our nuclear weapons over the next ten years. Any such modernization must be limited, as Obama promised, to simply maintaining existing weapons and not developing any new warheads--no new designs, no new missions, no new military capabilities for our nuclear weapons. 

Urge them to vote to ratify the New START treaty. Let them know that the treaty is just the next logical step in reigning in nuclear proliferation, and that you want them to keep working to reduce the arsenal further. Emphasize that "modernization" must not be a cover for developing new nuclear weapons of any kind: how can we convince any other country to stop its nuclear development if we do not stop our own?

Contact both your U.S. Senators:

Telephone: Call the Senate switchboard at (202) 224-3121, ask for your Senator's office, and once there, ask for her/his legislative aide on defense issues and leave your message with that aide.
Email: Click through to your Senator's website using www.senate.gov and leave a message.
Write: Send a postcard to: Senator (first & last name), U.S. Senate, Washington D.C. 20510.  (Postcards won't be delayed like envelopes will in the check for dangerous substances).

 

April 2010: Really Getting to Zero

 

The 1970 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) has been ratified by 187 countries. From May 3rd to 28th, 2010, the UN will host the NPT Review Conference held every 5 years.

The NPT prohibits the non-nuclear-weapon countries that have ratified the Treaty from acquiring nuclear weapons. It commits all nuclear-weapon nations that have ratified the Treaty (US, Russia, China, France, UK) to pursue negotiations to eliminate all nuclear weapons, currently about 23,000 worldwide. Many of the non-nuclear countries have grown impatient over these 40 years and several have threatened to pull out of the NPT and acquire their own nuclear weapons unless the nuclear-armed countries carry out their side of the deal.

Today we face the real threats of nuclear proliferation, nuclear terrorism, accidents, or mistaken use. There have been several close calls. In response to these threats, and to fulfill our legal commitment to the NPT, we urge President Obama, at the NPT Review Conference, to call for the start of negotiations leading to the elimination of nuclear weapons. This would be the first time for nations to come together to achieve this goal.

The call for these negotiations is supported by these recent events:
• the unanimous vote of the US Conference of Mayors
• an international petition to President Obama with more than 2,000,000 signatures
• a statement by 3,700 members of Mayors for Peace from 135 countries
• the unanimous vote of the UN Security Council "to pursue negotiations in good faith on effective measures relating to nuclear arms reduction and disarmament."

This Month's Action: Contact President Obama

Thank him for his statements supporting the elimination of nuclear weapons. Ask him, while he attends the 2010 NPT Review Conference, to call for the start of negotiations leading to nuclear abolition. Point out that this is his chance to jettison Cold War nuclear doctrine and bolster America's credibility as it presses to keep Iran, North Korea, and other countries from building their own nuclear arsenals.

Contact: President Barack Obama
www.whitehouse.gov/contact
Tel: 202 456 1111 (9:00 am to 5:00 pm DC time)
Fax: 202 456 2461
Letters to the White House may take 6-10 weeks to arrive, and you may not get through by phone or fax, so we suggest you leave a message on the White House website.

Additional information about this issue

About the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT)
http://www.un.org/en/conf/npt/2010/

Text of the NPT
http://disarmament.un.org/TreatyStatus.nsf

Article VI of the NPT “Each of the Parties to the Treaty undertakes to pursue negotiations in good faith on effective measures relating to cessation of the nuclear arms race at an early date and to nuclear disarmament, and on a treaty on general and complete disarmament under strict and effective international control.”

The Statement by the US Conference of Mayors June 2009 unanimously “AFFIRMING THE ROLE OF CITIES IN ACHIEVEMENT OF A PEACEFUL WORLD FREE OF NUCLEAR WEAPONS BY 2020”:
http://usmayors.org/resolutions/77th_conference/international05.asp

Watch this 4 minute video form Ploughshares Fund President Joe Cirincione about why the climate is right to act now to rid ourselves of Nuclear Weapons:
http://ploughshares.org/moment/video

Sunday, May 2nd, NYC: International Day of Actions for a Nuclear-Free World

Join with thousands of people from around the world on the eve of the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) Review Conference at the United Nations. Hundreds of international organizations have come together to organize a day of action to bring pressure to bear on world leaders who will be attending the NPT conference to make nuclear abolition a reality in our lifetimes. This will be the first large anti-nuclear rally in years, inspiring and empowering, building a sense of global united action. It should also be a lot of fun. Bring yourself, your family, and your friends!

For more details, go to peaceandjusticenow.org.